Toonarific Interviews
- Kingman Hui

May 17, 2004

Another great Vegetable Soup interview. This time, Jude managed to talk with one of the guys from the 'Long Ago' segment, the sequence with the skateboarders who skate back into time!

It's great to meet you Kingman! You contacted me to
try and find episodes of 'Long Ago' which appeared in
Vegetable Soup series II, you were the youngest
skateboarder, the asian boy. What made you contact me
out of the blue?

Well it was because I was thinking about "Vegetable
Soup" the other night, so I decided to do a Google
search and see what would happen. Not a whole lot,
though I did find that discussion board, and saw your
name come up rather frequently. Since some of those
messages are going back a couple of years, I figured
the matter of getting the tapes was resolved by now,
and the next logical conclusion for me was to see if
something was being offered on Ebay. Sure enough, it
would turn out to be the same Jude Barnes I'd been
reading about. The last time I ever remember
"Vegetable Soup" airing (in the NYC area anyway) was
in the early 80's, and so arguably I've been waiting
more than 20 years to view them again. I knew that the
tapes (or prints) had to exist in somebody's hands,
but I never knew where to begin to search for
something as obscure as this.

How did you get involved with Vegetable Soupís
'Long Ago' segments?

Let's see then. It's Summer of 1977. I was 10 years
old, and Star Wars had just come out in theaters. My
sister who would have been 25 at the time was very
interested in show business, and heard somehow that
they were looking to cast an Asian boy for a TV show
I'd never heard of. I came down (to Manhattan) to be
auditioned, and I remember their initial impressions
that I might've been a little too young for what they
had in mind. Ultimately though, there was something
they liked about me, and so I was aboard. I think I
was already starting to get into skateboarding by that time, so
maybe that could have been an extra factor that helped
me get the part. Some of my recollections about doing
the show are a little sketchy now. Some memories still
stand out very clearly to me, and other parts I'm sure
have been forgotten. Seems like "Long Ago" wasn't a
part of every VS installment, and I don't think they
began airing until 1978. I remember a thank you letter
from the studio at the end of the summer (of '77), and
a listing of air dates at the bottom, with my episodes
circled in pen. I remember my sixth grade teacher
proudly announcing that somebody in class was going to
be on TV, and all of her students were encouraged to
watch. It was funny because even back then, people had
largely never heard of "Vegetable Soup". It came on
quite early in the morning, and in those days of
course, to miss it was to never see it again. Some
people (classmates) did make it a point to tune in,
which relieved me because otherwise you're full of
crap, and there is no one to back you up.

What do you remember about the other people you
were working with?

All of the cast and crew who worked on that were
from the NYC area, and I was the youngest member of
the cast. If I was turning 11 that summer, the other
kids were probably 13 or 14. A big difference to me,
because they were all teenagers now, and I was still
yet a kid. There were days when I'd see the other cast
members, and other days where I was the only kid
around. By the end of that summer, I grew really close
to the other kids, and remember feeling very attracted
to the two girls in the cast.

How about the sets?

The studio where most of the interior shots were
done, was in an old office building on Broadway, just
north of Times Square. Since the kids got separated by
the time travel, consider that I was only called in to
work on days where I would actually be needed. I do
remember seeing the model for the Outerscope ship, as
well as the puppets laying about in
an open storage container, though I never got to see
that stuff in use. Perhaps "Long Ago" was scheduled to
use the studio on certain days, and "Outerscope II" on
others. I do remember filming an episode there
involving me and this black kid ending up meeting this magician, and being put into this wicker basket and made to vanish. The wicker basket would appear again in another episode, where I am supposed to be rescued from off the side of a cliff. That episode was done on location in the woods somewhere, and I remember a scene where I am helping another character haul the basket down a slope. That was really a tough one for me, as the basket was nearly as large as I was, and I was helping an adult haul it downhill. The opening shot you see of the kids skateboarding back through time was shot in a corridor of a museum up in Albany. That was a fun day, I remember. There were no lines to remember, and no pressure to act, just shots of us kids skateboarding down this slick hallway. Some of the voice over work (the narration you hear in the
episodes) was also recorded in that museum for some reason. At 11 years
old, I remember having a hard time with that, because
something was funny to me the whole day, and I
couldn't stop laughing.

Any memories with any cast members who were/are
well known?

There was another day I remember doing an episode
with Larry Hama, who would later be better known for
writing Marvel Comics like "GI Joe", and "Punisher:
War Zone". This was an episode having to do with the
Chinese being used for (under slave-like conditions)
to build the trans-continental railroad. A scene I
remember doing was inside a train tunnel (of an old
factory or warehouse somewhere), where Chinese
laborers are conspiring to strike. I'm not sure I've
ever actually seen that episode for myself, though I
do remember being down on those tracks. It was spooky
in there.

After watching the sequences I sent you, what
memories came back to you?

I think I had completely forgotten all about the
episode where we met Hiawatha in the woods. I remember
having a serious crush on my co-star during our scenes together, and seeing the footage again makes me wish I could go back and live forever in the Summer of 1977. The actor who played Hiawatha (I didn't hang out with the adults really) was quite good, and I have a feeling I'm seeing that particular episode for the very first time. Overall though, the acting and production values on "Long Ago" really varied. Some mildly engaging, others God-awful. Even when "Vegetable Soup" first aired here in the 70's, I
remember looking forward to seeing the adventures of
the "Outerscope" kids, as much as I did my own "Long
Ago" segments. Seeing "lost" footage of myself 26
years later got me very emotional, I must say. You
can't imagine what it means to me to have a document
of this memorable moment of my life. There was one
particular shot of me turning my head in profile, and
I look exactly like my father, who passed away 9 years
ago this week. I want to express my deepest thanks for
putting this tape together for me. There is one more
little thing you could do for me though. At the very
end of each episode in Series 2 are the names of the
"Long Ago" kids, including me. I wonder if you could
make a note of their names, because I would love to
follow up on what they're all up to now. I've long
since forgotten the names,
but would love to find out where those kids are right
now. How funny would that be to reunite the cast of
that show, eh?

What do you think about Vegetable Soup now that
youíre seeing it again as an adult?

To some, the show might seem dated, or bizarre,
creepy, or kitschy, but it had an important lesson for
young people about what's so important about having
cultural diversity. I was already a huge Star Trek fan
at the time "Long Ago" was being made, so I "got" the
cultural, moralistic, and idealistic messages being
conveyed in VS, as well as "Big Blue Marble". I would
actually be interested in what the creator of the show
had to say.